Pat Abrahams, Nunawading
Letter, The Age, 31/3/07
The Prime Minister's unrelenting belief is that it doesn't matter if Australia contributes to poisoning the atmosphere or the country is ravaged by climate change as long as Australians have jobs.
Out of guilt or as a political ploy, he has decided to throw 200 million taxpayer dollars at impoverished countries to stop them deforesting. Such an idea was slammed by the previous Malaysian prime minister as a Western notion to hamper the growth of developing countries. Rightly so; they are as concerned about jobs as we are.
If Mr Howard is the realist he claims to be, he would understand that the nations he is targeting have a high rate of illiteracy — their people know little and care even less about global warming. The idea of dangling millions before officials of dubious integrity is unlikely to catch on, because the success of this scheme cannot be guaranteed. If reports are any indication, vast amounts of tsunami dollars have yet to reach the victims. What assurance does the Australian taxpayer have that this wild scheme will produce results?
31 March, 2007
LETTER: A necessary step
Dr Mark Zirnsak, Synod of Victoria and Tasmania, Uniting Church in Australia
Letter, The Age, 31/3/07
Letter, The Age, 31/3/07
It has been disappointing to hear the Howard-bashing in response to the Prime Minister's announcement of $200 million to be spent on tackling illegal and unsustainable logging in our region.
According to the International Tropical Timber Organisation, of 206.7 million hectares of permanent forest estate in the Asia Pacific region in 2005, only 19.5 million hectares were being sustainably managed. Our partner churches in places such as the Philippines and Indonesia identify illegal logging as a serious issue.
At the same time, we agree that the Australian Government should restrict timber and wood product imports to Australia to those that are certified, where feasible. Also, the necessary and welcome action on unsustainable logging in the region does not relieve the Government of the need to take serious action in reducing Australia's contribution to dangerous climate change. Finally, we share concerns about regulation of logging in some places in Australia, especially Tasmania. However, this is a state government as much as a federal government issue.
29 March, 2007
LETTER: Kyoto conundrum
Geoff Richardson, Glen Iris
The Age, 29/1/07
THE Labor Party is keen to sign the Kyoto Agreement but has not advised us which industries it would have to close in order to comply with the Kyoto emission requirements.
The Age, 29/1/07
THE Labor Party is keen to sign the Kyoto Agreement but has not advised us which industries it would have to close in order to comply with the Kyoto emission requirements.
Countries with nuclear power stations would find it easier to sign the agreement than countries like Australia whose electricity is mostly provided by coal-fired power stations. The closing of several coal-fired power stations and industries with large electricity consumption would probably be required if the Labor Party were serious about Australia signing the agreement.
The planting of vast areas of forest is a better and quicker means of achieving carbon dioxide emission stabilisation, at least until alternative methods can be properly evaluated. But rather than engaging in the reforestation of South-East Asia, why not start in Australia by turning low-productivity agricultural land back into forest?
LETTER: Plank and mote
Matthew Salter, Greensborough
The Age, 29/3/2007
JOHN Howard is concerned with the loss of Australian jobs because of any response to climate change, and so has decided to help reduce logging in Asia. Just wondering, Prime Minister, how many jobs will be lost in Asia?
The Age, 29/3/2007
JOHN Howard is concerned with the loss of Australian jobs because of any response to climate change, and so has decided to help reduce logging in Asia. Just wondering, Prime Minister, how many jobs will be lost in Asia?
The Government needs to be reminded of the biblical principle of removing the plank from your own eye before worrying about the speck of dust in the eye of another. Stop shipping our climate change problems off-shore, Mr Howard and focus on making changes in our own country.
Perhaps start by ratifying the Kyoto Protocol. Maybe then move on to stopping the logging of old-growth forests and investing in renewable energy. Oh, and de-deifying the economy might help: change does cost money, but it's money well invested.
THE AGE: Timber DNA profiles reduce market for illegal logging
Philip Hopkins
March 29, 2007
ONE of Australia's largest timber importers has introduced technology that ensures that no wood it brings into Australia has been illegally logged.
Simmonds Lumber now conducts DNA testing of timber — a world first — that verifies the exact source of each tree being imported from Indonesia. The test is similar to DNA testing of humans.
The technology is expected to strengthen the fight against the estimated $400 million worth of illegally logged timber products now imported into Australia annually.
Simmonds, which has an annual turnover of $100 million, has invested more than $250,000 in the past five years to develop the technology with Singapore timber auditing company Certisource.
A genetic profile is taken of each tree while it is growing in legally allocated concession areas in Indonesia. Simmonds chief executive Paul Elsmore says a sample is also sent to Certisource in Singapore.
The genetic profile is then rematched with another genetic analysis once the logs have arrived at the production mill in Indonesia.
"This proves the log has come from the concession," Mr Elsmore said. "It's checked against the data in Singapore."
The approved timber is then processed through the mill, where it is audited by Certisource, before finally being exported to Australia.
Mr Elsmore said he was confident the technology would make Australia a world leader in the global fight against illegal logging.
Mr Elsmore said Indonesia was suffering one of the highest deforestation rates in the world, with more than 80 per cent of all wood produced and sold there thought to be illegal.
"In the past five years, though, the Government has made huge inroads into reducing this," he said. "It's improving every day."
Mr Elsmore said the legal concessions were probably in regrowth native forest areas.
Many auditing systems rely on a "certificate of origin" issued in the source country to prove the legality of the cargo. "However, these systems can be corrupted. Many log smugglers sidestep the authorities by providing false certificates," Mr Elsmore said.
About 150,000 cubic metres of sawn timber is imported into Australia from South-East Asia every year. Simmonds has imported about 10,000 cubic metres of DNA-tested merbau products into Australia in a test program.
Australia imports about $4 billion worth of forest products annually, but has a trade deficit of about $2 billion in forest products.
http://www.certisource.net
Original article
March 29, 2007
ONE of Australia's largest timber importers has introduced technology that ensures that no wood it brings into Australia has been illegally logged.
Simmonds Lumber now conducts DNA testing of timber — a world first — that verifies the exact source of each tree being imported from Indonesia. The test is similar to DNA testing of humans.
The technology is expected to strengthen the fight against the estimated $400 million worth of illegally logged timber products now imported into Australia annually.
Simmonds, which has an annual turnover of $100 million, has invested more than $250,000 in the past five years to develop the technology with Singapore timber auditing company Certisource.
A genetic profile is taken of each tree while it is growing in legally allocated concession areas in Indonesia. Simmonds chief executive Paul Elsmore says a sample is also sent to Certisource in Singapore.
The genetic profile is then rematched with another genetic analysis once the logs have arrived at the production mill in Indonesia.
"This proves the log has come from the concession," Mr Elsmore said. "It's checked against the data in Singapore."
The approved timber is then processed through the mill, where it is audited by Certisource, before finally being exported to Australia.
Mr Elsmore said he was confident the technology would make Australia a world leader in the global fight against illegal logging.
Mr Elsmore said Indonesia was suffering one of the highest deforestation rates in the world, with more than 80 per cent of all wood produced and sold there thought to be illegal.
"In the past five years, though, the Government has made huge inroads into reducing this," he said. "It's improving every day."
Mr Elsmore said the legal concessions were probably in regrowth native forest areas.
Many auditing systems rely on a "certificate of origin" issued in the source country to prove the legality of the cargo. "However, these systems can be corrupted. Many log smugglers sidestep the authorities by providing false certificates," Mr Elsmore said.
About 150,000 cubic metres of sawn timber is imported into Australia from South-East Asia every year. Simmonds has imported about 10,000 cubic metres of DNA-tested merbau products into Australia in a test program.
Australia imports about $4 billion worth of forest products annually, but has a trade deficit of about $2 billion in forest products.
http://www.certisource.net
Original article
23 March, 2007
THE AGE: Bushwhacked by logging industry
Marcus Ward
The Age, March 23, 2007
THE recently announced closure of the Black Forest Timbers (BFT) sawmill at Woodend is far more than just another story about yet another small business shutting its gates. It's the story of the end of a myth that has underpinned the state's logging industry for three decades: the myth of sustainable logging.
Black Forest Timber was established in 1974 at a time when the logging industry was struggling with low profits, dropping demand and a dwindling log supply caused by decades of overlogging and poor forest management. Loggers were being hammered by imports and competition from domestic pine.
Out of this crisis sprang a new industry model. BFT was both a creation of and an ardent practitioner of the then new business model. The new approach changed fundamentally the way state forests have been managed as well as the relationships between government, industry, bureaucracy and the community.
In the 1980s the new logging industry plan gained momentum and was embraced by governments at all levels, by the unions and the bureaucrats. An essential change was the move to intensive logging. Selective logging all but disappeared in favour of clear-felling. At the same time the areas of logging also dramatically increased.
In turn, this required the introduction of export woodchipping as a convenient way to profit from and practically deal with the huge mountain of trees being felled.
Herein lay a troublesome hurdle. Woodchipping has never been accepted by Victorians. Many polls have been carried out over many years. They all register a very high disapproval level. In an effort to sell the new approach to government and the community, a PR campaign was mounted and vigorously maintained, often using government grants.
The plan became more than a plan; it became a dogma. A new vocabulary was consciously developed to distinguish old "unsustainable logging" from the new "sustainable logging". "Logging" became "harvesting". The "logging industry" became the "timber industry". "Woodchips" weren't chipped trees, but rather the "waste from the forest floor that would otherwise be burnt". From dogma to mythology, criticism was incomprehensible to believers.
The industry needed huge subsidies, and they got them; again and again. They sold the idea of "sustainability" at every opportunity. It justified the enormous injection of taxpayer support because it carried with it the notion of building something for the future, something permanent.
In this new era, loggers were not only successful business managers, they were environmental stewards. This was an important part of the message.
There have been many industry restructures and rescue plans over the past 30 years.
As industry target after target failed, new plans substituted for old as quickly they failed. "Value adding" has arguably been used by no industry as successfully as Victoria's hardwood loggers for raiding the public purse. There have been export grants and product development grants. There were grants to "prove up" the viability of kiln-dried beams. There were grants to improve efficiency of kiln drying and steaming. There have been transport subsidies, marketing subsidies and several adjustment packages.
For a small sawmill with limited prospects of expansion, BFT's access to government support has been extraordinary. In just the past four years it has received about $1 million a year in transport subsidies and has also received several $1 million-plus industry development grants. Distributed over the
14 sawmill worker jobs disappearing with the closing of the sawmill, this equates to subsidies and grants of $150,000 a worker a year over the past four years.
The amounts of money thrown at hardwood loggers in recent times is sobering. In 2000, Steve Bracks signed an agreement with the Howard Government that locked in a further 20 years of export woodchipping and clear-felling in western Victoria; $63 million was set aside for more industry adjustments and to ensure this was a final helping hand from government. BFT was overjoyed. Two years later the Bracks Government determined that the local forests upon which BFT depended were logged out and it decided to end all native hardwood logging west of the Hume Highway. It introduced yet another "new plan": Our Forests, Our Future. Bracks threw another $80 million in industry adjustment at the loggers and reduced sawlogging by about 30 per cent but did not reduce the area of state forest being logged. Instead, less went to sawmills and more to woodchips. They continue to believe and invest.
Good myths are potent and often endure against the odds. So it was with the sustainable logging myth. Because Labor and Liberal governments had invested so heavily, they ignored the obvious warning signs of failure. Instead, they became more desperate to "make it work". Clear-felling and woodchipping were rapidly killing the hardwood sawmilling industry. Because failures were always met with new adjustment plans, failures were hidden by the "good news" of new grants and investments.
In 2000 an alternative industry plan was developed by conservation groups and Treasury. It offered a no job loss, no woodchipping, transition into plantations for western Victoria. Initially, the state's peak industry body and some sawmills received it positively.
It was the veto of BFT and the CFMEU forestry division that scuttled any hope of a secure future in plantations. Instead, BFT opted for a continued future in native forests, and hoped for the impossible.
New Zealand, with an economy about the size of Victoria's, and facing the same postwar logging industry structural problems, took another path:
it diversified and eventually completely made the transition into purpose-planted plantations. It ended all logging in public native forests in 2000.
By 2004 the NZ logging industry directly employed 23,000 people and accounted for 4 per cent of gross domestic product. It had annual sales of $5 billion, with $3.5 billion of that earned in export. It was NZ's third-biggest export earner. In Orbost, long viewed as the logging capital of Victoria, the signs along the highway proudly identifying Orbost as Victoria's timber town have recently been removed. Expect another round of industry adjustment packages soon.
Marcus Ward is forestry spokesman for the Victorian Greens
Original article
The Age, March 23, 2007
THE recently announced closure of the Black Forest Timbers (BFT) sawmill at Woodend is far more than just another story about yet another small business shutting its gates. It's the story of the end of a myth that has underpinned the state's logging industry for three decades: the myth of sustainable logging.
Black Forest Timber was established in 1974 at a time when the logging industry was struggling with low profits, dropping demand and a dwindling log supply caused by decades of overlogging and poor forest management. Loggers were being hammered by imports and competition from domestic pine.
Out of this crisis sprang a new industry model. BFT was both a creation of and an ardent practitioner of the then new business model. The new approach changed fundamentally the way state forests have been managed as well as the relationships between government, industry, bureaucracy and the community.
In the 1980s the new logging industry plan gained momentum and was embraced by governments at all levels, by the unions and the bureaucrats. An essential change was the move to intensive logging. Selective logging all but disappeared in favour of clear-felling. At the same time the areas of logging also dramatically increased.
In turn, this required the introduction of export woodchipping as a convenient way to profit from and practically deal with the huge mountain of trees being felled.
Herein lay a troublesome hurdle. Woodchipping has never been accepted by Victorians. Many polls have been carried out over many years. They all register a very high disapproval level. In an effort to sell the new approach to government and the community, a PR campaign was mounted and vigorously maintained, often using government grants.
The plan became more than a plan; it became a dogma. A new vocabulary was consciously developed to distinguish old "unsustainable logging" from the new "sustainable logging". "Logging" became "harvesting". The "logging industry" became the "timber industry". "Woodchips" weren't chipped trees, but rather the "waste from the forest floor that would otherwise be burnt". From dogma to mythology, criticism was incomprehensible to believers.
The industry needed huge subsidies, and they got them; again and again. They sold the idea of "sustainability" at every opportunity. It justified the enormous injection of taxpayer support because it carried with it the notion of building something for the future, something permanent.
In this new era, loggers were not only successful business managers, they were environmental stewards. This was an important part of the message.
There have been many industry restructures and rescue plans over the past 30 years.
As industry target after target failed, new plans substituted for old as quickly they failed. "Value adding" has arguably been used by no industry as successfully as Victoria's hardwood loggers for raiding the public purse. There have been export grants and product development grants. There were grants to "prove up" the viability of kiln-dried beams. There were grants to improve efficiency of kiln drying and steaming. There have been transport subsidies, marketing subsidies and several adjustment packages.
For a small sawmill with limited prospects of expansion, BFT's access to government support has been extraordinary. In just the past four years it has received about $1 million a year in transport subsidies and has also received several $1 million-plus industry development grants. Distributed over the
14 sawmill worker jobs disappearing with the closing of the sawmill, this equates to subsidies and grants of $150,000 a worker a year over the past four years.
The amounts of money thrown at hardwood loggers in recent times is sobering. In 2000, Steve Bracks signed an agreement with the Howard Government that locked in a further 20 years of export woodchipping and clear-felling in western Victoria; $63 million was set aside for more industry adjustments and to ensure this was a final helping hand from government. BFT was overjoyed. Two years later the Bracks Government determined that the local forests upon which BFT depended were logged out and it decided to end all native hardwood logging west of the Hume Highway. It introduced yet another "new plan": Our Forests, Our Future. Bracks threw another $80 million in industry adjustment at the loggers and reduced sawlogging by about 30 per cent but did not reduce the area of state forest being logged. Instead, less went to sawmills and more to woodchips. They continue to believe and invest.
Good myths are potent and often endure against the odds. So it was with the sustainable logging myth. Because Labor and Liberal governments had invested so heavily, they ignored the obvious warning signs of failure. Instead, they became more desperate to "make it work". Clear-felling and woodchipping were rapidly killing the hardwood sawmilling industry. Because failures were always met with new adjustment plans, failures were hidden by the "good news" of new grants and investments.
In 2000 an alternative industry plan was developed by conservation groups and Treasury. It offered a no job loss, no woodchipping, transition into plantations for western Victoria. Initially, the state's peak industry body and some sawmills received it positively.
It was the veto of BFT and the CFMEU forestry division that scuttled any hope of a secure future in plantations. Instead, BFT opted for a continued future in native forests, and hoped for the impossible.
New Zealand, with an economy about the size of Victoria's, and facing the same postwar logging industry structural problems, took another path:
it diversified and eventually completely made the transition into purpose-planted plantations. It ended all logging in public native forests in 2000.
By 2004 the NZ logging industry directly employed 23,000 people and accounted for 4 per cent of gross domestic product. It had annual sales of $5 billion, with $3.5 billion of that earned in export. It was NZ's third-biggest export earner. In Orbost, long viewed as the logging capital of Victoria, the signs along the highway proudly identifying Orbost as Victoria's timber town have recently been removed. Expect another round of industry adjustment packages soon.
Marcus Ward is forestry spokesman for the Victorian Greens
Original article
21 March, 2007
THE AGE: A cut above
Andrew Darby
The Age, March 21, 2007
Timber giant Gunns has spooked the Lennon Government into fast-tracking its $1.4 billion pulp mill. But that's the Tasmanian way.
You need to understand the way things are done in Tasmania to see why Australia's largest-ever timber industry project could fall over like a house of cards in a gentle breeze. Leave aside any notions of pragmatic decisions based on calm reflection. Set up instead a permanent chasm, a deep ravine in the political landscape, with the timber industry on one side and greens on the other. Remember the island's tiny, two-degrees- of-separation business and political worlds, its obsession with the notion of the one, giant industrial project that will secure its future, and repetitive history of disputes over these developments.
And remember also that this is the nursery of the granite batsmen David Boon and Ricky Ponting, and of the firebrand novelist Richard Flanagan. Count on the refusal of some individuals to be bullied.
All of this may help mainlanders understand that the $1.4 billion Gunns pulp mill is more what Tasmanians might call a "rum 'un" - a strange character - than "a ringtail roarer", their term for a certainty. For more than three years, Tasmania's biggest home-grown company, Gunns Ltd, has been trying to complete its transformation from Launceston-based sawmiller and hardware store to global competitor in production of the universal paper stock, bleached kraft pulp.
Gunns employs 1700 people and has a $700 million annual turnover. Before a share price decline, it was valued at more than $1 billion on the market. From the contracted tree fellers in the bush, to the woodchip loaders and the counter staff at its stores, Gunns is there. The company reaches throughout Tasmania.
When Premier Paul Lennon paid for $100,000 of renovations to his graceful but ancient sandstone house in the country, a Gunns subsidiary, Hinman Wright Manser, did the work. When the mill project in the Tamar Valley, north of Launceston, was announced, Prime Minister John Howard went to Tasmania to commit $5 million to ease Gunns' task of assessing it.
And when old-growth logging in Tasmania blew up as an issue in the last federal election campaign, timber industry interests dominated by Gunns spent nearly $486,000 on political advertising.
After the Howard Government won with a forests policy backed by Gunns executive chairman John Gay, the company donated $45,000 to the Liberals in Tasmania, and $20,000 to the party's associated Free Enterprise Foundation. It gave nothing to Labor over the same period.
Little surprise that when Gunns began to make noises in January about pulling out of the normal statutory assessment process for its giant mill, the Premier interrupted his leave to get on the highway to Launceston, to Gay's office.
Unusually in Australian corporate life, Gay is both chief executive and chairman of Gunns. He is the one who travels the globe, meets the politicians, strides the shop floor and fields the media.
Endearingly awkward of speech, evidently respected by his employees, he grew up in timber, drives a modest European car and farms for recreation. Gay is also a tiger of an opponent. Back in the 1980s, he took on a royal commission, refusing to be browbeaten when Gunns came under attack because its then chairman, Edmund Rouse, had used money on deposit with the company to attempt to bribe a state MP, and thereby buy a parliamentary majority. Though other witnesses folded, Gay sat like a rock, unscathed.
Also to appear in the box at the time under adverse questioning were two other men who are now Gunns directors, businessman David McQuestin, and the former Liberal premier Robin Gray.
In Tasmania, being what it is, there is further symmetry to this history: Gray's fall from power 18 years ago was hastened by his handling of the failed Wesley Vale pulp mill project put forward by Gunns' predecessor, North Broken Hill.
Under the present Gunns board, the company remains a fierce defender of its beliefs, and plays hard. It is pursuing a highly controversial damages case against 15 individuals and evironmental organisations. Already two statements of claim have been thrown out by the Victorian Supreme Court.
According to the Wilderness Society, the actual damages claimed in the third statement - the financial losses caused, rather than the exemplary damages sought - are far outweighed by the legal costs so far awarded against Gunns.
"What we're sick of is the malicious damage some people are doing to us," Gay said of the pursuit. "We will continue to chase that down to the nth degree."
Then last year, as the pulp mill assessment moved to its critical stages, Gay started to come up against Tasmanian characters much like himself.
The chairman of the state's Resource Planning and Development Commission, Julian Green, was the ultimate legal-minded public servant, deeply experienced and dismissive of the limelight.
Green was blunt with Gunns. At a commission public hearing called to consider the company's confusing 7000-page, $11-million submission, Green suggested that perhaps Gunns might like to do it again.
When the Lennon Government began to stick its nose into the process through a "cheer squad" it called the Pulp Mill Taskforce, Green had had enough. Assessment panel member Warwick Raverty resigned when the taskforce brought up past work that might be perceived as biased, and Green followed.
Unfortunately for Gunns, his replacement as commission chairman did not appear to be any more helpful to the company. A retired judge, Christopher Wright, a stickler for procedure, refused to meet Gay privately for discussions.
He also criticised Gunns for its repeated failure to meet deadlines set by the commission, pushing out far beyond May a decision on the mill's approval.
"It has become quite apparent that due to accumulated delays, all or most of which appear to have resulted from Gunns' failure or inability to comply with their own prognostications, or the panel's requirements, that timeline can no longer apply," Wright said.
At first Gunns tersely agreed to a new timetable set by Wright that would not have seen a decision on the project before November.
But behind the scenes, the Premier was seeking something quite different. At a meeting with Wright in late February, Lennon proposed plans to introduce special legislation and abandon public hearings to speed up assessment of the mill.
"I was gobsmacked, to be perfectly honest," Wright said. After thinking about it, he offered his resignation. Faced with this additional highly embarrassing loss, Lennon backed down. But Gunns remained dissatisfi ed. On March 14 it formally withdrew from the commission process. "We have tried to have discussions with people during this process and, from within the Government and RPDC, have never been able to talk to anyone," Gay told the ABC. "They have said: 'we can't talk to you' and obviously at the directions hearing Mr Wright said that he can't talk to me.
"I have offered to put a project which would add value to the forests and add value to Tasmania, that I can't talk to anyone about. We cannot continually run a process which has not got any timelines."
Each six-month delay would add $60 million to the cost of the project, Gunns calculated, as a result of bank commitment fees, financial hedging costs and additional construction costs. Instead it "required" a process that delivered a decision by June 30. It was time for the Premier to hit the road to Launceston again.
He put forward a plan to take the proposal, now ballooned to a breathtaking 9000 pages, through State Parliament.
A relaxed Lennon recounted his Sunday evening visit to Gunns' office where he met Gay. The Premier laid out his plan, Gay "withdrew, presumably to consult others in the company", and came back an hour later to agree.
Lennon said that essentially the mill had failed at the commission because of the organisation's inability to determine a final timetable. "Investors need certainty, and the process did not supply certainty. This process has to end now by August 31."
But he confirmed that he had an understanding with Gunns that the project would be unchanged from the one that fell short in the commission. Dr Raverty, the Victorian organic chemist whose resignation from the assessment panel started the cards collapsing, is convinced that on existing data, the mill will not be environmentally acceptable at its site in the Tamar Valley.
Raverty said Gunns was yet to show that its airborne emissions would fall within prescribed limits, in an airshed already notorious for poor quality. Gunns had also left open the option of using a bleaching process not used by any other pulp mill in the world.
"You would have to worry that the process is going to get out of control some days and produce highly toxic organochlorines. If that happened, Australia would be in breach of its international obligations under the UN Convention on Persistent Organic Pollutants."
Lennon is confident that consultants employed by the State Government will be able to make the project comprehensible to state MPs. The mill would meet stringent environmental guidelines, or be rejected, he said. "If it doesn't meet the emission limits, I won't be voting for it."
Having abandoned the process that he previously endorsed, Lennon apparently faces fewer difficulties in getting the project through the Parliament. Less than half-way into a fouryear term, he has political time on his hands, and a secure lower house majority.
In the state's upper house, conservative independents and Labor MPs, who could be expected to be kind towards the project, predominate. Their sensitivity to lobbying is legendary. More immediately, Lennon faces heavy political criticism over his attempt to sway Wright.
As the Tasmanian Greens leader Peg Putt surveyed the special treatment awarded to the party's longtime foe, she said: "This is not in the public interest. This is in Gunns' interest. In the final wash-up, Parliament is set to make an entirely political approval after a second-rate charade."
Original link
The Age, March 21, 2007
Timber giant Gunns has spooked the Lennon Government into fast-tracking its $1.4 billion pulp mill. But that's the Tasmanian way.
You need to understand the way things are done in Tasmania to see why Australia's largest-ever timber industry project could fall over like a house of cards in a gentle breeze. Leave aside any notions of pragmatic decisions based on calm reflection. Set up instead a permanent chasm, a deep ravine in the political landscape, with the timber industry on one side and greens on the other. Remember the island's tiny, two-degrees- of-separation business and political worlds, its obsession with the notion of the one, giant industrial project that will secure its future, and repetitive history of disputes over these developments.
And remember also that this is the nursery of the granite batsmen David Boon and Ricky Ponting, and of the firebrand novelist Richard Flanagan. Count on the refusal of some individuals to be bullied.
All of this may help mainlanders understand that the $1.4 billion Gunns pulp mill is more what Tasmanians might call a "rum 'un" - a strange character - than "a ringtail roarer", their term for a certainty. For more than three years, Tasmania's biggest home-grown company, Gunns Ltd, has been trying to complete its transformation from Launceston-based sawmiller and hardware store to global competitor in production of the universal paper stock, bleached kraft pulp.
Gunns employs 1700 people and has a $700 million annual turnover. Before a share price decline, it was valued at more than $1 billion on the market. From the contracted tree fellers in the bush, to the woodchip loaders and the counter staff at its stores, Gunns is there. The company reaches throughout Tasmania.
When Premier Paul Lennon paid for $100,000 of renovations to his graceful but ancient sandstone house in the country, a Gunns subsidiary, Hinman Wright Manser, did the work. When the mill project in the Tamar Valley, north of Launceston, was announced, Prime Minister John Howard went to Tasmania to commit $5 million to ease Gunns' task of assessing it.
And when old-growth logging in Tasmania blew up as an issue in the last federal election campaign, timber industry interests dominated by Gunns spent nearly $486,000 on political advertising.
After the Howard Government won with a forests policy backed by Gunns executive chairman John Gay, the company donated $45,000 to the Liberals in Tasmania, and $20,000 to the party's associated Free Enterprise Foundation. It gave nothing to Labor over the same period.
Little surprise that when Gunns began to make noises in January about pulling out of the normal statutory assessment process for its giant mill, the Premier interrupted his leave to get on the highway to Launceston, to Gay's office.
Unusually in Australian corporate life, Gay is both chief executive and chairman of Gunns. He is the one who travels the globe, meets the politicians, strides the shop floor and fields the media.
Endearingly awkward of speech, evidently respected by his employees, he grew up in timber, drives a modest European car and farms for recreation. Gay is also a tiger of an opponent. Back in the 1980s, he took on a royal commission, refusing to be browbeaten when Gunns came under attack because its then chairman, Edmund Rouse, had used money on deposit with the company to attempt to bribe a state MP, and thereby buy a parliamentary majority. Though other witnesses folded, Gay sat like a rock, unscathed.
Also to appear in the box at the time under adverse questioning were two other men who are now Gunns directors, businessman David McQuestin, and the former Liberal premier Robin Gray.
In Tasmania, being what it is, there is further symmetry to this history: Gray's fall from power 18 years ago was hastened by his handling of the failed Wesley Vale pulp mill project put forward by Gunns' predecessor, North Broken Hill.
Under the present Gunns board, the company remains a fierce defender of its beliefs, and plays hard. It is pursuing a highly controversial damages case against 15 individuals and evironmental organisations. Already two statements of claim have been thrown out by the Victorian Supreme Court.
According to the Wilderness Society, the actual damages claimed in the third statement - the financial losses caused, rather than the exemplary damages sought - are far outweighed by the legal costs so far awarded against Gunns.
"What we're sick of is the malicious damage some people are doing to us," Gay said of the pursuit. "We will continue to chase that down to the nth degree."
Then last year, as the pulp mill assessment moved to its critical stages, Gay started to come up against Tasmanian characters much like himself.
The chairman of the state's Resource Planning and Development Commission, Julian Green, was the ultimate legal-minded public servant, deeply experienced and dismissive of the limelight.
Green was blunt with Gunns. At a commission public hearing called to consider the company's confusing 7000-page, $11-million submission, Green suggested that perhaps Gunns might like to do it again.
When the Lennon Government began to stick its nose into the process through a "cheer squad" it called the Pulp Mill Taskforce, Green had had enough. Assessment panel member Warwick Raverty resigned when the taskforce brought up past work that might be perceived as biased, and Green followed.
Unfortunately for Gunns, his replacement as commission chairman did not appear to be any more helpful to the company. A retired judge, Christopher Wright, a stickler for procedure, refused to meet Gay privately for discussions.
He also criticised Gunns for its repeated failure to meet deadlines set by the commission, pushing out far beyond May a decision on the mill's approval.
"It has become quite apparent that due to accumulated delays, all or most of which appear to have resulted from Gunns' failure or inability to comply with their own prognostications, or the panel's requirements, that timeline can no longer apply," Wright said.
At first Gunns tersely agreed to a new timetable set by Wright that would not have seen a decision on the project before November.
But behind the scenes, the Premier was seeking something quite different. At a meeting with Wright in late February, Lennon proposed plans to introduce special legislation and abandon public hearings to speed up assessment of the mill.
"I was gobsmacked, to be perfectly honest," Wright said. After thinking about it, he offered his resignation. Faced with this additional highly embarrassing loss, Lennon backed down. But Gunns remained dissatisfi ed. On March 14 it formally withdrew from the commission process. "We have tried to have discussions with people during this process and, from within the Government and RPDC, have never been able to talk to anyone," Gay told the ABC. "They have said: 'we can't talk to you' and obviously at the directions hearing Mr Wright said that he can't talk to me.
"I have offered to put a project which would add value to the forests and add value to Tasmania, that I can't talk to anyone about. We cannot continually run a process which has not got any timelines."
Each six-month delay would add $60 million to the cost of the project, Gunns calculated, as a result of bank commitment fees, financial hedging costs and additional construction costs. Instead it "required" a process that delivered a decision by June 30. It was time for the Premier to hit the road to Launceston again.
He put forward a plan to take the proposal, now ballooned to a breathtaking 9000 pages, through State Parliament.
A relaxed Lennon recounted his Sunday evening visit to Gunns' office where he met Gay. The Premier laid out his plan, Gay "withdrew, presumably to consult others in the company", and came back an hour later to agree.
Lennon said that essentially the mill had failed at the commission because of the organisation's inability to determine a final timetable. "Investors need certainty, and the process did not supply certainty. This process has to end now by August 31."
But he confirmed that he had an understanding with Gunns that the project would be unchanged from the one that fell short in the commission. Dr Raverty, the Victorian organic chemist whose resignation from the assessment panel started the cards collapsing, is convinced that on existing data, the mill will not be environmentally acceptable at its site in the Tamar Valley.
Raverty said Gunns was yet to show that its airborne emissions would fall within prescribed limits, in an airshed already notorious for poor quality. Gunns had also left open the option of using a bleaching process not used by any other pulp mill in the world.
"You would have to worry that the process is going to get out of control some days and produce highly toxic organochlorines. If that happened, Australia would be in breach of its international obligations under the UN Convention on Persistent Organic Pollutants."
Lennon is confident that consultants employed by the State Government will be able to make the project comprehensible to state MPs. The mill would meet stringent environmental guidelines, or be rejected, he said. "If it doesn't meet the emission limits, I won't be voting for it."
Having abandoned the process that he previously endorsed, Lennon apparently faces fewer difficulties in getting the project through the Parliament. Less than half-way into a fouryear term, he has political time on his hands, and a secure lower house majority.
In the state's upper house, conservative independents and Labor MPs, who could be expected to be kind towards the project, predominate. Their sensitivity to lobbying is legendary. More immediately, Lennon faces heavy political criticism over his attempt to sway Wright.
As the Tasmanian Greens leader Peg Putt surveyed the special treatment awarded to the party's longtime foe, she said: "This is not in the public interest. This is in Gunns' interest. In the final wash-up, Parliament is set to make an entirely political approval after a second-rate charade."
Original link
19 March, 2007
ABC ONLINE: Lennon says Gunns agrees to new pulp mill process
ABC Online
Monday, March 19, 2007
The Tasmanian Government says Gunns has agreed to take part in the new assessment of its $1.5 billion pulp mill.
The Government hopes to put an end-of-August deadline on the assessment.
The Premier, Paul Lennon, says it would be impossible for a new assessment of the mill to meet the timber company's end-of-financial year deadline.
"The 31st of August was the date that would allow us to achieve a responsible and sensible examination of the data," he said.
But he says Gunns has agreed to the new approach.
Mr Lennon maintains he does not see the need for public hearings, and that Parliamentarians will only have three sitting days to consider the final report before voting on whether the pulp mill should proceed.
The Premier hopes to have details of selection criteria for the new consultants ready by the time Parliament's Lower House debates the bill on Thursday.
Mr Lennon says the Federal Government will need to conduct its own assessment to ensure the mill meets Commonwealth guidelines.
Original article
Monday, March 19, 2007
The Tasmanian Government says Gunns has agreed to take part in the new assessment of its $1.5 billion pulp mill.
The Government hopes to put an end-of-August deadline on the assessment.
The Premier, Paul Lennon, says it would be impossible for a new assessment of the mill to meet the timber company's end-of-financial year deadline.
"The 31st of August was the date that would allow us to achieve a responsible and sensible examination of the data," he said.
But he says Gunns has agreed to the new approach.
Mr Lennon maintains he does not see the need for public hearings, and that Parliamentarians will only have three sitting days to consider the final report before voting on whether the pulp mill should proceed.
The Premier hopes to have details of selection criteria for the new consultants ready by the time Parliament's Lower House debates the bill on Thursday.
Mr Lennon says the Federal Government will need to conduct its own assessment to ensure the mill meets Commonwealth guidelines.
Original article
12 March, 2007
ARTICLE: Forestry sector has growing role in combating climate change, says minister
Philip Hopkins
March 12, 2007
Victoria's forest industry will play a big role in the State Government's climate change and greenhouse policy, according to the Minister for Agriculture, Joe Helper.
Mr Helper said emissions trading was perhaps the biggest opportunity for forestry. '
'Placing a value on carbon may open up new opportunities for forest industries," he said.
Mr Helper said forestry featured strongly in the Department of Primary Industry's action agenda on climate change, drawn up last year.
"While it may be an inconvenient truth for some, the forest and wood products sector has an important role to play," he said.
Mr Helper was giving the opening address to a seminar on forestry's role in combating global warming. The seminar was sponsored by Australian Paper and the Victorian Association of Forest Industries.
Mr Helper said strategies in the department's action agenda included:
Forests provided other environmental services, such as habitat maintenance, ameliorating salinity and providing long-term stability for landscapes.
"And let us not forget that growing, harvesting and processing wood provides one of the most ecologically sustainable forms of employment," he said.
"As a land use option, growing trees for timber in the right landscapes is one of the more economically productive options."
However, Mr Helper said awareness of all this in the broader community was not what it should be.
"Some of the relevant carbon accounting tools are also in need of attention," he said. Mr Helper said wood products such as furniture and construction stored carbon in the longer term, while newsprint and packaging, even though shorter term, may be recycled or remain inert in rubbish tips.
"All wood and wood products ultimately have the potential to be used as carbon-neutral fuel, which can effectively offset (greenhouse) emissions," he said.
Mr Helper said wood and wood products should gain greater recognition as a sustainable building material of choice.
"In this regard, I am aware that some building codes discriminate against the use of timber, particularly that from native forests.
"This is something we will continue to work together with industry to address, because Victoria has perhaps one of the most effective forest management systems in the world," he said.
Mr Helper said Victoria's reserve system was now one of the most extensive in the developed world. VicForests, the State Government's commercial forestry arm, had just received Australian Forestry Standard certification and was regularly audited by the state's Environment Protection Authority.
Source
March 12, 2007
Victoria's forest industry will play a big role in the State Government's climate change and greenhouse policy, according to the Minister for Agriculture, Joe Helper.
Mr Helper said emissions trading was perhaps the biggest opportunity for forestry. '
'Placing a value on carbon may open up new opportunities for forest industries," he said.
Mr Helper said forestry featured strongly in the Department of Primary Industry's action agenda on climate change, drawn up last year.
"While it may be an inconvenient truth for some, the forest and wood products sector has an important role to play," he said.
Mr Helper was giving the opening address to a seminar on forestry's role in combating global warming. The seminar was sponsored by Australian Paper and the Victorian Association of Forest Industries.
Mr Helper said strategies in the department's action agenda included:
- A profitable and credible forestry carbon sink industry.
- Greater recognition of the value of forest products over man-made or fabricated alternatives.
- Potential of carbon-neutral bio-energy from sustainable forest management.
- Engaging with Victoria's timber producers to help them mitigate climate risks.
Forests provided other environmental services, such as habitat maintenance, ameliorating salinity and providing long-term stability for landscapes.
"And let us not forget that growing, harvesting and processing wood provides one of the most ecologically sustainable forms of employment," he said.
"As a land use option, growing trees for timber in the right landscapes is one of the more economically productive options."
However, Mr Helper said awareness of all this in the broader community was not what it should be.
"Some of the relevant carbon accounting tools are also in need of attention," he said. Mr Helper said wood products such as furniture and construction stored carbon in the longer term, while newsprint and packaging, even though shorter term, may be recycled or remain inert in rubbish tips.
"All wood and wood products ultimately have the potential to be used as carbon-neutral fuel, which can effectively offset (greenhouse) emissions," he said.
Mr Helper said wood and wood products should gain greater recognition as a sustainable building material of choice.
"In this regard, I am aware that some building codes discriminate against the use of timber, particularly that from native forests.
"This is something we will continue to work together with industry to address, because Victoria has perhaps one of the most effective forest management systems in the world," he said.
Mr Helper said Victoria's reserve system was now one of the most extensive in the developed world. VicForests, the State Government's commercial forestry arm, had just received Australian Forestry Standard certification and was regularly audited by the state's Environment Protection Authority.
Source
06 March, 2007
ARTICLE: Forest council aims to bridge green gap
Philip Hopkins
March 6, 2007
THE Forest Stewardship Council forest certification scheme has been formally launched in Australia with a pledge to increase FSC membership.
FSC Australia chief executive Michael Spencer said the group was seeking support for a two-year program to develop an FSC-accredited Australian forest management standard.
This would involve building consensus on key issues, he said, including a definition of high conservation value Australian forests, appropriate forest management practices and community benefit from forestry operations.
FSC maintains its standards ensure sustainable forest management and a rigorous chain of custody system that allows tracking of certified wood and wood products from FSC-certified forests from manufacture to the retailer and customer.
Mr Spencer said the number of Australian companies with FSC chain of certification had grown from about 10 in November 2005 to more than 30.
FSC Australia is supported by environment groups, several forest products companies and community groups.
Environmental members include WWF-Australia, the Wilderness Society, Friends of the Earth, the Australian Conservation Foundation and Greenpeace. Business members include ITC, Hancock Victorian Plantations, Australian Paper and Timbercorp.
In Australia, more than 650,000 hectares of forest have been certified to FSC standards. Globally, more than 80 million hectares have been certified in 70 countries to FSC standards, and about 5000 companies are participating in the FSC chain of custody system.
Original article
March 6, 2007
THE Forest Stewardship Council forest certification scheme has been formally launched in Australia with a pledge to increase FSC membership.
FSC Australia chief executive Michael Spencer said the group was seeking support for a two-year program to develop an FSC-accredited Australian forest management standard.
This would involve building consensus on key issues, he said, including a definition of high conservation value Australian forests, appropriate forest management practices and community benefit from forestry operations.
FSC maintains its standards ensure sustainable forest management and a rigorous chain of custody system that allows tracking of certified wood and wood products from FSC-certified forests from manufacture to the retailer and customer.
Mr Spencer said the number of Australian companies with FSC chain of certification had grown from about 10 in November 2005 to more than 30.
FSC Australia is supported by environment groups, several forest products companies and community groups.
Environmental members include WWF-Australia, the Wilderness Society, Friends of the Earth, the Australian Conservation Foundation and Greenpeace. Business members include ITC, Hancock Victorian Plantations, Australian Paper and Timbercorp.
In Australia, more than 650,000 hectares of forest have been certified to FSC standards. Globally, more than 80 million hectares have been certified in 70 countries to FSC standards, and about 5000 companies are participating in the FSC chain of custody system.
Original article
09 February, 2007
ARTICLE: Forestry Tasmania to appeal Wielangta ruling
ABC Online, February 9, 2007
Forestry Tasmania is set to challenge the Federal Court's ruling on logging in the Wielangta State Forest, saying the ruling could jeopardise all forestry and farming activity in Tasmania.
Forestry Tasmania will appeal against the court's ruling that logging activities in the area breached the Regional Forest Agreement.
Greens Senator Bob Brown successfully challenged Forestry Tasmania in the Federal Court.
Forestry Tasmania managing director Bob Gordon says the ruling has thrown doubt over the bulk of the company's wood supply contracts.
He says the effects could be felt further afield, impacting not only on forestry, but agriculture and development.
"It could have the effect of effectively meaning no development could occur in Tasmania," he said.
Senator Brown is not impressed, saying Mr Gordon is scare-mongering.
"He's trying to say, 'oh, woe is us, this is the sky falling in'," he said.
Both parties say they are confident of winning the appeal.
Original article
Forestry Tasmania is set to challenge the Federal Court's ruling on logging in the Wielangta State Forest, saying the ruling could jeopardise all forestry and farming activity in Tasmania.
Forestry Tasmania will appeal against the court's ruling that logging activities in the area breached the Regional Forest Agreement.
Greens Senator Bob Brown successfully challenged Forestry Tasmania in the Federal Court.
Forestry Tasmania managing director Bob Gordon says the ruling has thrown doubt over the bulk of the company's wood supply contracts.
He says the effects could be felt further afield, impacting not only on forestry, but agriculture and development.
"It could have the effect of effectively meaning no development could occur in Tasmania," he said.
Senator Brown is not impressed, saying Mr Gordon is scare-mongering.
"He's trying to say, 'oh, woe is us, this is the sky falling in'," he said.
Both parties say they are confident of winning the appeal.
Original article
08 February, 2007
ARTICLE: Illegal logging threatens survival of orangutans
Karen Calabria
The Australian, February 08, 2007
NAIROBI: The UN warned yesterday that illegal logging by international companies could lead to a 98 per cent loss of Southeast Asia's tropical rainforests by 2022, threatening the habitat of tens of thousands of endangered orangutans.
To supply the growing global demand for timber and biofuels such as palm oil, illegal loggers have begun to raid Indonesia's national parks, resulting in a devastating loss of biodiversity, a report by the Nairobi-based UN Environment Program found.
"This is a stark reminder of what we're talking about when we're looking at the degradation of natural resources in the context of globalisation," UNEP chief Achim Steiner said at a UN environment meeting in the Kenyan capital. "The pressure from the global market is leading the illegal logging industry into the national parks."
The report, The Last Stand of the Orangutan: State of Emergency, found more than 73 per cent of all logging in Indonesia was illegal, and that traces of the illicit timber trade had been found in 37 of the country's 41 national parks, the last remaining habitats of the Bornean and Sumatran orangutans.
Up to 98 per cent of the country's tropical rainforests could be destroyed by 2022 if the exploitation of timber continued unabated, the report said.
Urgent action was needed to counter the effects of illegal logging, which the report found to be the work of large multinational corporations, not impoverished local people.
"At the current rate of intrusion, some of these parks may be severely degraded in three to five years," said the lead author of the report, Christian Nelleman.
Current estimates put the number of Bornean orangutans at between 45,000 and 69,000, while only 7300 Sumatran orangutans remain in the wild, signifying a 91 per cent decrease in population since the beginning of the 20th century, the report says.
"Orangutan populations are seriously affected when their forest is destroyed or logged, not least because they are often killed for meat or to protect newly planted crops."
Other orangutans are stolen from their habitats while logging occurs and smuggled out of the country - often on the same boats that are transporting the illegal timber.
Efforts are being made to monitor the illegal logging trade in Indonesia, but the Government has few resources to use as it attempts to cover the vast areas of forest.
AFP
Original article
The Australian, February 08, 2007
NAIROBI: The UN warned yesterday that illegal logging by international companies could lead to a 98 per cent loss of Southeast Asia's tropical rainforests by 2022, threatening the habitat of tens of thousands of endangered orangutans.
To supply the growing global demand for timber and biofuels such as palm oil, illegal loggers have begun to raid Indonesia's national parks, resulting in a devastating loss of biodiversity, a report by the Nairobi-based UN Environment Program found.
"This is a stark reminder of what we're talking about when we're looking at the degradation of natural resources in the context of globalisation," UNEP chief Achim Steiner said at a UN environment meeting in the Kenyan capital. "The pressure from the global market is leading the illegal logging industry into the national parks."
The report, The Last Stand of the Orangutan: State of Emergency, found more than 73 per cent of all logging in Indonesia was illegal, and that traces of the illicit timber trade had been found in 37 of the country's 41 national parks, the last remaining habitats of the Bornean and Sumatran orangutans.
Up to 98 per cent of the country's tropical rainforests could be destroyed by 2022 if the exploitation of timber continued unabated, the report said.
Urgent action was needed to counter the effects of illegal logging, which the report found to be the work of large multinational corporations, not impoverished local people.
"At the current rate of intrusion, some of these parks may be severely degraded in three to five years," said the lead author of the report, Christian Nelleman.
Current estimates put the number of Bornean orangutans at between 45,000 and 69,000, while only 7300 Sumatran orangutans remain in the wild, signifying a 91 per cent decrease in population since the beginning of the 20th century, the report says.
"Orangutan populations are seriously affected when their forest is destroyed or logged, not least because they are often killed for meat or to protect newly planted crops."
Other orangutans are stolen from their habitats while logging occurs and smuggled out of the country - often on the same boats that are transporting the illegal timber.
Efforts are being made to monitor the illegal logging trade in Indonesia, but the Government has few resources to use as it attempts to cover the vast areas of forest.
AFP
Original article
04 February, 2007
LETTER: Catchments need trees
David Allen, Rosebud
The Age, 4/2/2007
In reply to Noel Jackson (Letters, 28/1), have a close look at where our water catchments are and you will notice they are in higher altitude and forested areas. These areas are commonly called rainbelts and were usually uninhabited until recently. High-density forests attract high rainfall; cut down the forests and there's much less rain.
The Age, 4/2/2007
In reply to Noel Jackson (Letters, 28/1), have a close look at where our water catchments are and you will notice they are in higher altitude and forested areas. These areas are commonly called rainbelts and were usually uninhabited until recently. High-density forests attract high rainfall; cut down the forests and there's much less rain.
28 January, 2007
LETTER: Note - trees use water
MARK POYNTER, Institute of Foresters of Australia, Doncaster East
The Age, 28/1/07
It is disappointing that public discussion about the small annual timber harvest in the Thomson catchment continues to ignore the overriding impact of fire in determining how much "water guzzling" regrowth resides in our catchments.
The critical importance of keeping fire out of our catchments has been obvious during the recent bushfires. It is worth noting that the loggers were at the forefront of the firebreak construction that saved the Thomson catchment.
If maximising water yield was our only criterion we'd be better off with pastured or concreted catchments. If we prefer healthy forested catchments we must accept that trees use water.
The Age, 28/1/07
It is disappointing that public discussion about the small annual timber harvest in the Thomson catchment continues to ignore the overriding impact of fire in determining how much "water guzzling" regrowth resides in our catchments.
The critical importance of keeping fire out of our catchments has been obvious during the recent bushfires. It is worth noting that the loggers were at the forefront of the firebreak construction that saved the Thomson catchment.
If maximising water yield was our only criterion we'd be better off with pastured or concreted catchments. If we prefer healthy forested catchments we must accept that trees use water.
LETTER: Eyes wide shut
Noel Jackson, North Ringwood
The Age, 28/1/07
Your story talks about the loss of run-off into our water catchments. The alternative view is that logging increases rather than decreases runoff into our catchments. When rain falls, the drops gathers on leaves, trunks and soak into ground cover where it is consumed by natural processes or evaporated. If you were to clear the catchment and the ground is able to harden up through less ground cover, then the water has to run off.
Logging in water catchment areas is therefore going to aid our water system through less evaporation and absorption into the soil. Unfortunately that argument does not suit the greenies which is why they will shut their eyes.
The Age, 28/1/07
Your story talks about the loss of run-off into our water catchments. The alternative view is that logging increases rather than decreases runoff into our catchments. When rain falls, the drops gathers on leaves, trunks and soak into ground cover where it is consumed by natural processes or evaporated. If you were to clear the catchment and the ground is able to harden up through less ground cover, then the water has to run off.
Logging in water catchment areas is therefore going to aid our water system through less evaporation and absorption into the soil. Unfortunately that argument does not suit the greenies which is why they will shut their eyes.
LETTER: Fire in the forest
Peter Sheehan, Camberwell
The Age, 28/1/07
The report by Peter Weekes on the impact of timber harvesting on the Thompson catchment (21/1) is a good illustration of the difficulties surrounding this issue. By far the greatest is to get accurate reporting of unbiased information. Mr Weekes reports projections of potential water yield based not on the real world but on the assumption that the catchment will not eventually be burnt in a wildfire.
The catchment was burnt out in 1939 and very nearly was again in the recent bushfires. We might be able to save it from future fires but, based on history and ecology, that is unlikely.
A fair comparison would be to model the expected water yields from the forest with and without timber harvesting assuming that it is burnt by a wildfire at least once each century.
It is not clear whether it is the hydrologists or a reporter that are determined to give the timber industry another few kicks but it is high time that the public was given a more compete picture.
The Age, 28/1/07
The report by Peter Weekes on the impact of timber harvesting on the Thompson catchment (21/1) is a good illustration of the difficulties surrounding this issue. By far the greatest is to get accurate reporting of unbiased information. Mr Weekes reports projections of potential water yield based not on the real world but on the assumption that the catchment will not eventually be burnt in a wildfire.
The catchment was burnt out in 1939 and very nearly was again in the recent bushfires. We might be able to save it from future fires but, based on history and ecology, that is unlikely.
A fair comparison would be to model the expected water yields from the forest with and without timber harvesting assuming that it is burnt by a wildfire at least once each century.
It is not clear whether it is the hydrologists or a reporter that are determined to give the timber industry another few kicks but it is high time that the public was given a more compete picture.
LETTER: Parties on logging drip
Lynn Good, Deloraine, Tasmania
The Age, 28/01/2007
Peter Weekes' story on the massive diversion of catchment water to forestry ("Dry city counts costs of logging," 21/1), missed a crucial part of the story, the flows of money between the logging industry and major political parties. Without this stage, it is hard to understand why our elected leaders would allow the loggers to divert vast amounts of increasingly precious water to an industry which is already drawing heavily on the public purse.
The Age, 28/01/2007
Peter Weekes' story on the massive diversion of catchment water to forestry ("Dry city counts costs of logging," 21/1), missed a crucial part of the story, the flows of money between the logging industry and major political parties. Without this stage, it is hard to understand why our elected leaders would allow the loggers to divert vast amounts of increasingly precious water to an industry which is already drawing heavily on the public purse.
ARTICLE: The reality of catchments
Seamus Bradley
The Age, 28/01/2007
The Age, 28/01/2007
MELBOURNE prides itself on its pristine water sources. Rain falls in our all-natural catchments and the water gurgles through native forests so beautiful you could imagine the girl with the sun in her hair stopping off to shoot a quick shampoo commercial.
The reality, as illustrated last week, is somewhat different. There are big burly blokes (and sheilas?) with chainsaws, mucky boots and heavy equipment in the catchments stripping out thousands of tonnes of timber for some sawlogs but mostly for woodchips.
The logging is done in the highest- rainfall area of the catchment, meaning that millions of litres of water are lost to you, the public, because young trees suck up more water than mature trees. As Doctors for Forests warn, logging in the catchments also has negative health implications.
But banning logging in the catchments could also have negative health impacts for state governments. Logging unions would fight anything that looks like a win for the pinko greenies, and government would need to avoid/offset any job losses, dodge a plunge in business confidence and soften any economic downturn that the economies of logging-dependent rural communities would face.
There is nothing simple about logging in the catchments and nothing elegant about the arguments around the matter.
For instance, reaction to our page-one story has ranged from "if you want water, cut down all the trees and concrete over the catchment" to "brave loggers save the Thomson catchment from raging bushfire".
So while city people need good clean water from pristine catchments, many country people need secure jobs that pay well. Are these two needs mutually exclusive? Should logging be moved to plantations — also controversial — where the timber is of consistently better quality?
Why is the whole topic shrouded in such secrecy? Why won't government and companies answer straight questions? What did the State Government mean when it announced on Thursday that it would be "moving some logging to maximise water harvesting"?
Which Victorian Greens politician hears the voice of Bob Brown as Obi-Wan Kenobi in his head?
Elsewhere there were bouquets and brickbats for Tom Hyland's opinion piece on Melbourne's transport woes. Brilliant say some, what a whinge say others.
And Professor Sue Willis is criticised for saying that ill-informed criticism is driving the brightest away from teaching because it tarnishes the profession's reputation.
Original article25 January, 2007
ARTICLE: 'No plan' to export timber
Philip Hopkins
The Age, 25/01/2007
The Victorian Government has denied it will export timber logs salvaged from the state's bushfires.
Rumours have been swirling in the Victorian timber industry that export sales of salvaged logs were being considered.
But a spokesman for Environment Minister John Thwaites said that in the first instance, timber salvaged would be offered to Victorian customers.
"If they are all not sold in Victoria, we can look at other options," he said.
VicForests' director of strategy and planning, Pat Groenhout, confirmed that VicForests' first focus would be to sell salvaged timber to meet existing commitments.
"If there is excess produced, we will also make first offers to domestic customers," he said. "If there is excess beyond that, we would look at all opportunities."
About 1.1 million hectares of native forest have been burnt in Victoria this summer — the same extent of forest that was burnt in 2002-03. Some fires are still burning, and the bushfire season is only half over.
Mr Groenhout said VicForests estimated that about 2 million cubic metres of standing sawlog had been burnt in this year's bushfires.
"We don't know how much of that is burnt beyond repair or burnt at all," he said. "That's the first assessment — they're rough figures because we're doing it on the run."
Mr Groenhout said the first step would be to check the condition of the fire area. This would determine how much timber was still alive and how much would continue to grow.
"That gives us two things — what we can focus on for the salvage program, and the area that will contribute to future sustainable yield," he said."There is clearly an impact on long-term sustainable yield, but we don't yet know what that will be."
Victorian Association of Forest Industries chief executive Trish Caswell said it was crucial for the Government to consider the Victorian industry's long-term needs, and not just immediate cash income.
Original article
The Age, 25/01/2007
The Victorian Government has denied it will export timber logs salvaged from the state's bushfires.
Rumours have been swirling in the Victorian timber industry that export sales of salvaged logs were being considered.
But a spokesman for Environment Minister John Thwaites said that in the first instance, timber salvaged would be offered to Victorian customers.
"If they are all not sold in Victoria, we can look at other options," he said.
VicForests' director of strategy and planning, Pat Groenhout, confirmed that VicForests' first focus would be to sell salvaged timber to meet existing commitments.
"If there is excess produced, we will also make first offers to domestic customers," he said. "If there is excess beyond that, we would look at all opportunities."
About 1.1 million hectares of native forest have been burnt in Victoria this summer — the same extent of forest that was burnt in 2002-03. Some fires are still burning, and the bushfire season is only half over.
Mr Groenhout said VicForests estimated that about 2 million cubic metres of standing sawlog had been burnt in this year's bushfires.
"We don't know how much of that is burnt beyond repair or burnt at all," he said. "That's the first assessment — they're rough figures because we're doing it on the run."
Mr Groenhout said the first step would be to check the condition of the fire area. This would determine how much timber was still alive and how much would continue to grow.
"That gives us two things — what we can focus on for the salvage program, and the area that will contribute to future sustainable yield," he said."There is clearly an impact on long-term sustainable yield, but we don't yet know what that will be."
Victorian Association of Forest Industries chief executive Trish Caswell said it was crucial for the Government to consider the Victorian industry's long-term needs, and not just immediate cash income.
Original article
22 January, 2007
ARTICLE: Canberra cuts down timber standard
Michael Spencer
Chief executive of the Forest Stewardship Council Australia.
January 22 2007
The failure of the Federal Government to respond swiftly and effectively to Australia's $400 million involvement in the international trade in illegal wood is symptomatic of a deeper malaise in Canberra over policies towards the forest industry.
The minister, Eric Abetz, recently released a "do almost nothing" response to an earlier report that identified the extent of Australia's involvement in the illegal wood trade — a trade that robs poor nations of income, causes deforestation and contributes to global warming.
The Australian industry needs leadership from Canberra on this issue. Apart from the impact in host countries, US research shows that the trade in illegal wood is depressing world prices for wood products by between 7 and 16 per cent.
Unfortunately, the Government has chosen to ignore the firm action being taken by European governments in Britain, Denmark and Belgium.
In these countries, Forest Stewardship Council certification is an important part of action being taken by governments through public procurement programs that ask for verification of legality and sustainability of timber supplies.
Canberra's problem with FSC certification was illustrated when Senator Abetz opened a forest growers' conference recently by criticising British Government ministers for "promoting the virtues of FSC" and for "suggesting Australia should adopt this standard".
The strength of his antipathy was highlighted on radio the next day when he attempted to disparage the FSC as a "Mexico-based" group, even though it has been based in Bonn with the strong support of the German Government for several years.
These churlish attacks appear to be driven by a desire of the Tasmanian senator to defend forest practices in his home state rather than an understanding of what is happening globally, and in the broader Australian industry.
The minister and his "me too" Opposition shadow, Tasmanian senator Kerry O'Brien, seem determined to establish Tasmanian practice as the benchmark for Australia rather than supporting the efforts of companies on the mainland to meet the global FSC standard.
In Victoria, the largest players in the forest products market, including Australian Paper, ITC, Hancock Victorian Plantations and Timbercorp, have adopted FSC certification. The industry association has also indicated its interest in the potential of FSC certification.
Western Australia has three tree plantations certified to FSC standards. In Queensland, the industry association recently joined FSC Australia. Nationally, more than half the privately owned tree plantations are FSC-certified.
One week after the minister's attacks on the FSC, about 70 people assembled near Melbourne to start developing an Australian FSC forest management standard. They included 20 corporate representatives, eight industry-association representatives and eight government representatives as well as the national environmental groups and people with industrial and community interests in forests.
In the same week, seminars in Melbourne and Sydney aimed at linking FSC-certified companies with architects and builders attracted more than 50 participants each.
Canberra needs to get over its mind-set that anything environmental groups support must be attacked and vilified.
The FSC provides neutral ground for economic, social and environmental interests to agree on what responsible forest management means on the ground. The FSC certification system is a market-driven tool for responsible forest management.
Strong growth in the FSC system globally is being driven by consumer concern about the environment and forests, and recognition by leading companies that dealing with this concern is important for developing their business.
Vince Erasmus, chief executive of ITC, said after the minister's attack on the FSC: "The vast majority of our end customers for both woodchip and sawn timber products demand FSC-certified product."
Erasmus went on to urge the Government to support the initiative to develop a national FSC standard for Australia because "certification delivers significant commercial advantage to our industry".
Academic research shows that consumers believe independent certification is helpful in verifying the origin of forest products and put most trust in independent non-government organisations such as the FSC to certify the products.
That is why the FSC has more than 5000 companies participating in its chain-of-custody system around the world and the number of Australian companies participating in this system has tripled in the past year from 10 to 30.
In Britain the nine major retailers now account for more than £1 billion ($A2.5 billion) in annual turnover of FSC-certified products. Many of them not only carry the products but are members and participate in the FSC system.
In the past two years, the presence of certified products in Britain has spread from major retailers down to smaller retailers.
The FSC system has also been picked up in government procurement policies and is the first global system recognised as verification of legality and sustainability in British Government public procurement policies.
It has spread to local government. The Greater London Authority has a policy that says: "We will purchase sustainably produced timber and timber products (such as joinery, fittings, furniture and veneers), specifying that products carry the Forest Stewardship Council certificate."
It has spread to the banking sector, where HSBC has published guidelines that state: "It is HSBC's preference to deal with customers in (the forestry and forest products sector) that are either operating managed forests that are certified by the Forest Stewardship Council, or equivalent FSC-recognised standard, or trade in products that are FSC-certified or equivalent."
In the Netherlands, 13 per cent of the wood trade is FSC-certified and one in four Dutch people look for FSC certification when buying forest products.
The picture in Switzerland is just as strong and FSC certification is spreading through Germany, Sweden and Italy and into the newly emerging countries of middle Europe while gradually picking up in Spain, Portugal and even France.
Across the Atlantic in North America, FSC certification is the issue for the paper industry, with companies such as Citigroup citing it in its policies. The green building industry is a major driver of demand for FSC-certified solid wood.
Of course Japan is another important market, where the FSC system is taking off, and that is having a big impact on buying decisions.
The same growth is taking place in Australia, where the biggest issues are the availability of FSC-certified papers and sawn wood.
Instead of trying to undermine the FSC system in Australia, Canberra politicians should be supporting efforts by the local industry to win a stronger share of global export markets through FSC certification.
A change in attitude towards the FSC would also give them more policy options to tackle Australia's participation in the global illegal wood trade and the opportunity to adopt the best-practice approach of the British Government.
Instead, both federal parties are obsessed with the local politics of Tasmania. Their obsession deprives the industry of genuine national political leadership.
Original article
Chief executive of the Forest Stewardship Council Australia.
January 22 2007
The failure of the Federal Government to respond swiftly and effectively to Australia's $400 million involvement in the international trade in illegal wood is symptomatic of a deeper malaise in Canberra over policies towards the forest industry.
The minister, Eric Abetz, recently released a "do almost nothing" response to an earlier report that identified the extent of Australia's involvement in the illegal wood trade — a trade that robs poor nations of income, causes deforestation and contributes to global warming.
The Australian industry needs leadership from Canberra on this issue. Apart from the impact in host countries, US research shows that the trade in illegal wood is depressing world prices for wood products by between 7 and 16 per cent.
Unfortunately, the Government has chosen to ignore the firm action being taken by European governments in Britain, Denmark and Belgium.
In these countries, Forest Stewardship Council certification is an important part of action being taken by governments through public procurement programs that ask for verification of legality and sustainability of timber supplies.
Canberra's problem with FSC certification was illustrated when Senator Abetz opened a forest growers' conference recently by criticising British Government ministers for "promoting the virtues of FSC" and for "suggesting Australia should adopt this standard".
The strength of his antipathy was highlighted on radio the next day when he attempted to disparage the FSC as a "Mexico-based" group, even though it has been based in Bonn with the strong support of the German Government for several years.
These churlish attacks appear to be driven by a desire of the Tasmanian senator to defend forest practices in his home state rather than an understanding of what is happening globally, and in the broader Australian industry.
The minister and his "me too" Opposition shadow, Tasmanian senator Kerry O'Brien, seem determined to establish Tasmanian practice as the benchmark for Australia rather than supporting the efforts of companies on the mainland to meet the global FSC standard.
In Victoria, the largest players in the forest products market, including Australian Paper, ITC, Hancock Victorian Plantations and Timbercorp, have adopted FSC certification. The industry association has also indicated its interest in the potential of FSC certification.
Western Australia has three tree plantations certified to FSC standards. In Queensland, the industry association recently joined FSC Australia. Nationally, more than half the privately owned tree plantations are FSC-certified.
One week after the minister's attacks on the FSC, about 70 people assembled near Melbourne to start developing an Australian FSC forest management standard. They included 20 corporate representatives, eight industry-association representatives and eight government representatives as well as the national environmental groups and people with industrial and community interests in forests.
In the same week, seminars in Melbourne and Sydney aimed at linking FSC-certified companies with architects and builders attracted more than 50 participants each.
Canberra needs to get over its mind-set that anything environmental groups support must be attacked and vilified.
The FSC provides neutral ground for economic, social and environmental interests to agree on what responsible forest management means on the ground. The FSC certification system is a market-driven tool for responsible forest management.
Strong growth in the FSC system globally is being driven by consumer concern about the environment and forests, and recognition by leading companies that dealing with this concern is important for developing their business.
Vince Erasmus, chief executive of ITC, said after the minister's attack on the FSC: "The vast majority of our end customers for both woodchip and sawn timber products demand FSC-certified product."
Erasmus went on to urge the Government to support the initiative to develop a national FSC standard for Australia because "certification delivers significant commercial advantage to our industry".
Academic research shows that consumers believe independent certification is helpful in verifying the origin of forest products and put most trust in independent non-government organisations such as the FSC to certify the products.
That is why the FSC has more than 5000 companies participating in its chain-of-custody system around the world and the number of Australian companies participating in this system has tripled in the past year from 10 to 30.
In Britain the nine major retailers now account for more than £1 billion ($A2.5 billion) in annual turnover of FSC-certified products. Many of them not only carry the products but are members and participate in the FSC system.
In the past two years, the presence of certified products in Britain has spread from major retailers down to smaller retailers.
The FSC system has also been picked up in government procurement policies and is the first global system recognised as verification of legality and sustainability in British Government public procurement policies.
It has spread to local government. The Greater London Authority has a policy that says: "We will purchase sustainably produced timber and timber products (such as joinery, fittings, furniture and veneers), specifying that products carry the Forest Stewardship Council certificate."
It has spread to the banking sector, where HSBC has published guidelines that state: "It is HSBC's preference to deal with customers in (the forestry and forest products sector) that are either operating managed forests that are certified by the Forest Stewardship Council, or equivalent FSC-recognised standard, or trade in products that are FSC-certified or equivalent."
In the Netherlands, 13 per cent of the wood trade is FSC-certified and one in four Dutch people look for FSC certification when buying forest products.
The picture in Switzerland is just as strong and FSC certification is spreading through Germany, Sweden and Italy and into the newly emerging countries of middle Europe while gradually picking up in Spain, Portugal and even France.
Across the Atlantic in North America, FSC certification is the issue for the paper industry, with companies such as Citigroup citing it in its policies. The green building industry is a major driver of demand for FSC-certified solid wood.
Of course Japan is another important market, where the FSC system is taking off, and that is having a big impact on buying decisions.
The same growth is taking place in Australia, where the biggest issues are the availability of FSC-certified papers and sawn wood.
Instead of trying to undermine the FSC system in Australia, Canberra politicians should be supporting efforts by the local industry to win a stronger share of global export markets through FSC certification.
A change in attitude towards the FSC would also give them more policy options to tackle Australia's participation in the global illegal wood trade and the opportunity to adopt the best-practice approach of the British Government.
Instead, both federal parties are obsessed with the local politics of Tasmania. Their obsession deprives the industry of genuine national political leadership.
Original article
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